A short stroll around the well-maintained grounds at Fairfield might give the impression that alumni have a great deal of influence on campus.
The Alumni House, which is just up the road from Alumni Hall, serves as a meeting place for the Student Alumni Association.
But despite the prominence of an alumni-designated buildings on campus, Fairfield alumni do not have as strong a say in University decisions as one might be led to believe.
Dartmouth College announced that its board of trustees would expand to 24 members, two-thirds chosen by the college and one-third elected by the alumni, according to a New York Times article.
This sparked a controversial debate since alumni previosuly appointed half the seat holders on the board.
Since 1891, Dartmouth alumni have elected eight trustees and the administration has appointed an additional eight, giving the college an unusually small board and an unusual level of alumni power.
Janet Canepa, director of alumni relations at Fairfield said, “At Fairfield, the Board of Trustees for the University is the sole governing body of the University and are all board-appointed, so the Dartmouth situation would never arise here.”
“The Board of Trustees is responsible for overseeing the effective governance of the University. It defines the mission of the University, establishes the general policies and approves the budget for its operation,” she said.
According to the University’s Web site, which lists the Board of Trustees for the 2006-2007 academic year, 27 out of the 39 members are alumni, including the chairperson of the board, Paul J. Hutson’82.
Despite the fact that the board is primarily filled with alumni, Fairfield is able to avoid significant alumni influence by appointing qualified people to these positions rather than allowing alumni to petition for the positions themselves, which had been the case at Dartmouth.
Canepa said, “The Fairfield University Alumni Association has no governing responsibility over Fairfield.”
“Their purpose is lively advance volunteerism, contributions and attendance at Fairfield University alumni events and other University activities and to support and promote the goals and objectives of Fairfield University,” she added.
Students don’t seem to be bothered with the lack of say granted to alumni but agree that they should be respected and kept informed about the state of University affairs.
“I think alumni opinions should be respected, but they should definitely not be the deciding factor in any on campus decision,” said Brenton Roman ’10.
Katie Neugebauer ’08 is the co-president of the Student Alumni Association on campus.
“Our primary role is to plan various activities that involve alumni on campus. Events like homecoming weekend and student/alumni sports tournaments are planned by us,” she said
“We definitely don’t discuss any decisions about campus with the alumni; we just plan events like Alumni weekend and encourage them to return to Fairfield,” she said.
“University-appointed people are on campus and have a better idea what’s going on, so I think its better that they make decisions,” said Craig Scoville ’08.
Kyra Barre ’11 shared similar feelings on the topic, despite only being on campus for short while.
“Alumni should have about a 5 percent say in campus decisions because they’re not on campus on a daily basis,” she said.
“Things are always changing,” said Julie Ruggieri ’10. “In order to make decisions, you have to be on campus to see what is happening.”
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